Night Watch
by Brave November
Summary: A low point for the Grey Warden.  Set during the search for Andraste's Ashes.


AN/Discalimer: Owning nothing but the character concept of the Grey Warden player character. Just something to write for the sake of writing. Thoughts that might have gone through the mind of a homesick young woman trying to manage a shitload of complications without showing weakness to anybody.

Kalli moved quietly through the camp, glad to be in leather instead of the chain mail she'd started wearing. It offered more protection, but it tired her much more quickly and left her aching at the end of the day from the strain of bearing so much weight. She knew she had to adapt and grow stronger, but it was still a relief to take off the clanking links and put on the soft-but-sturdy leather. It smelt better than the oily mail, though Garm's scent still lingered from the last time he'd curled up on it.

The dog looked up as if sensing her thoughts of him and grinned, tongue lolling. Kalli grinned back and scratched behind his ears. There were worse smells than warhound, despite what Wynne said. Disemboweled abominations, her own scorched flesh, and Sten's cooking- -and those were just the day's experiences. She was sure tomorrow would hold new ones. A spike of homesickness stabbed through her heart like an arrow as she thought of the way her home had smelt. The alienage was cramped and crowded, but dirty it was not, and their sewers were often better than the humans'- -after all, they had plenty of practice building them. She'd boiled the cheapest flowers she could find to perfume her home, and tucked small bags of dried herbs into her clothing and her father's.

The memory of their last hug flashed into her mind, and she blinked hard to keep tears from springing to her eyes. It was no bad thing to cry alone in the dark, but she refused to do it while she was on watch. She pushed a stubborn strand of hair out of her face and kept walking slow circles around the camp, with occasional stops by the fire to make sure Sten hadn't encountered anything either. _Imagine how homesick he must be_, she thought as the two exchanged nods_. If I long for home, he must be doubly bereft._ She resolved anew to find his sword. At least one of them should have a chance to go home if they survived. _If I don't get us all killed in their next forray through the tombs, or Loghain's men don't capture us, or the darkspawn don't overrun us this very night._ _May as well worry about the earth swallowing us up, or a dragon suddenly descending on us while I'm at it,_ she thought bitterly. It seemed that all she could do lately was worry: for Shianni and her father, trapped inside the Alienage; for the Arl of Redcliffe; for her kingdom; but especially for her comrades. It kept her awake even after the long days of scowering the ruined temple and the caverns, fighting abominations and crazed human cultists. She had to take at least one watch, or she woke up with worry clawing through her guts like a rat trying to eat its way out. Nothing less than complete exhaustion would allow her to sleep.

The grey fog that heralded its approach crept over her mind as the night wore on- -another hour, another half-hour, and she could rest. She passed Morrigan slinking from her isolated corner in the form of a fox and nodded. The witch barked a sharp greeting and followed her towards the communal fire, where Leliana sat rubbing the sleep from her eyes. Though tousled and tired-looking, the woman smiled brightly.

"Oh," she exclaimed in her lisping accent. "How charming! Morrigan, what cute ears you have! And that tail!" She chuckled. "Oh, you would make an adorable hat!" The witch-fox eyed her uncertainly for a moment, then trotted away on her first circuit of the camp. Kalli smiled a little. _And Father said I was bad at taking complements._

"Tomorrow, Leliana," she said, too tired for conversation. "I'm off to rest."

"Sleep well, Warden," the bard answered. "I will attempt to tease a smile out Sten tonight, yes? It can be done, I am certain."

"Tell me when you succeed," Kalli said around a yawn. The qunari often insisted on standing multiple watches, and the Warden was just as glad to let him. He would have all tomorrow to make up his rest if he wished, anyway. It was Alistair's turn to play the muscle. They'd been encountering a lot of mages as they went farther into the caverns, and she thought his skills as a templar might aid them more than even Sten's formidable strength. Of course, that meant tomorrow would be full of sullen silence and surly grunts, as well as the occasional forray into the camaraderie they'd shared before, doomed to peter out awkwardly as they remembered what had destroyed it.

Kalli shook her head to dispell the image of Lady Isolde sprawled on the floor. _Please let me be too tired for dreams tonight,_ she begged any kindly spirit that might be listening. She must be. She could barely keep her staggering footsteps in a straight line. The distance to her tent seemed to stretch into an infinite length, like a road in the Fade, mocking her with its nearness but never seeming to come any closer. When at last her hands brushed the canvas, she sighed with relief. Inside she peeled off her armor and her outer tunic, ready to welcome the brush of her rough woolen blankets as if they'd been sheets of silk.

A small noise made her freeze, hands automatically reaching for the blades that were never far away. She shook her head, wondering if she'd imagined it- -_or perhaps the dreams are already taking over- _-but it sounded again and she recognized it as low cry squeezing its way between clenched teeth. Dagger in hand she opened the tent flap. Garm was still curled outside, but his head was up and pointed towards Alistair's tent, ears cocked. Kalli sighed and put the dagger beside her sword. "Stay," she told the Mabari. "I'll get him." Strained as things had become between them, she still owed it to him to wake him from his nightmares before he roused the entire camp. He hadn't been kidding about screaming like a little girl all those nights ago, and she wanted to spare him the embarrassment of Morrigan's smirk, Wynne's concern, and Sten's disdain. None of them knew the horror of the darkspawn dreams, and without drinking the tainted blood they could not hope to. Besides, Alistair always woke her whenever he heard her thrashing. _We are still brothers-in-arms. It's the best I can hope for._

His tent was only a few feet away, and she half-ran the distance in a few quick strides. She fumbled with the tent flap and nearly fell inside in her haste. She let her knees hit the ground and felt for Alistair's bedroll with both hands. Blind but drawn by the sound of his smothered cries, she stumbled towards him. One hand brushed flesh, and she felt Alistair thrash. She fell more or less on top of him, his elbow bruising her arm and their heads cracking together as he flailed beneath her. "Alistair!" she hissed like an angry goose. "Alistair, wake up!" She felt blindly for his face and found an ear, which she pulled sharply. "Wake up!"

"Hauh!" The other warden's cry was choked and fearful. "Off! You. . .oh." His entire body sagged in relief. "It's you. Thank the Maker." His panting breath became a sigh, then subsided into quiet gasps. "Thank you. Thank you."

Kalli nodded silently, knowing he could feel her movement in the darkness. She couldn't speak- -the raw gratitude in his voice made tears threaten again, and she didn't dare let him hear her voice break. She didn't want the sorrow she felt for her companion's sake to be misconstrued as pity, which he would hate. And she definitely didn't want to break their unacknowledged pact of indifference during the day with whispers in the night. She knew she should leave, but she could feel Alistair's heart beating far too quickly still. Tentatively she traced a hand along his arm until she found his shoulder, followed the line of his jaw up to his hair, and stroked it lightly. Alistair tensed again, then turned his face into her touch. Beneath her ear, his heartbeat slowed.

"Did I scream?" he whispered eventually. Kalli shook her head no. "Good. I hate that. So does everybody else." His voice was sharp with self-reproach. "You never scream."

Kalli snorted. "It's not because of bravery," she whispered. "When the nightmares come I can't breath, I'm so frightened. The darkspawn part of me is cheering with the rest of the horde. I try to fight, try to yell something defiant, but I can't control my own thoat. I choke myself awake." She shuddered, and Alistair caught her hand in his. They were both cold. Forgetting her resolution, she nestled closer against him, feeling bare flesh where the blankets had been tossed away. Alistair's heart was speeding up again, his breath louder in her ear as he turned towards her. His fingers brushed the skin of her wrist, and his other hand stroked over her hair and down her back. Then he let both hands fall away.

"You should go," he whispered- -not angrily as she had half-feared, but without a trace of regret. "Can't have everyone knowing that the Grey Wardens huddle together like frightened children in the night, can we? Hardly good for morale."

Reluctantly Kalli nodded and pulled away. She stumbled outside and back to her tent, too tired and disgusted with herself to worry about Morrigan or Sten seeing her. She knew better than to hope that a nightmare and a hug would fix things between them- -well, she _should_ know better, anyway. Alistair had been her first real friend since the alienage, and she'd hoped they might be more until she'd betrayed him by killing his adopted father's wife. It didn't matter that it was the only thing she could do, short of killing the Arl's son, or that delaying even long enough to request aid from the Circle might have meant the death of all the Arl's people at the hands of the demon. She had destroyed the closest thing he had to a family.

_And I would do it again_, she thought, but with less force than usual. It _was_ the only sensible decision, but perhaps she should have tried harder, as Alistair insisted.

_I pay for it,_ she thought dully as she crawled into her bedroll. She had kept the deathwatch with the Arlessa as she would have one of her own people. She dreamed of the woman's body splayed within the bloodmage's circle like a broken doll. Worse, she sometimes saw the haunted eyes of the little boy, Connor, staring at her before she woke sick with guilt for having condemned the child to life without a mother- -a life she knew all too well. _I pay, but it will never be enough._

_What else could I have done?_ she demanded of the night. It gave her no answer. Huddling beneath her blankets, she cried for the father she would probably never see again, for the noblewoman who'd awed her with her sacrifice, for the child who had lost his mother and might loose his father if she didn't find Andraste's ashes. And, a little guiltily, for herself. _Perhaps I don't deserve a man_, she thought, awash with self-loathing. _I am cold-hearted and unnatural and selfish. I lost Nelaros before I could truly know him, and I was rude to him when he tried to get to know me. I lost Alistair, if I even had a chance with him. I belong alone. I should accept it and be done._ She whispered the words until they ceased sounding like a doom and became inescapable fact, as much a part of her as her hair or her pointed ears.

"I am alone. Always alone." Over and over until the words slurred and trailed into silence, tears drying on her pillow as she slept.


End file.
